Elizabeth Holmes makes improbable request to toss her conviction

Lawyers for Theranos Inc. founder Elizabeth Holmes made a long-shot attempt to get her fraud conviction thrown out by telling the judge who oversaw her trial a version of events that highlighted her company’s accomplishments.

It was a gamble that almost all white-collar criminal convicts make, and rarely win. Holmes returned Thursday to the federal courthouse in San Jose, California, for the first time since she was convicted in January to argue that no rational juror could have found her guilty of conspiracy and wire fraud beyond a reasonable doubt.

“Ms. Holmes didn’t make misrepresentations” to investors, “and didn’t know she was making misrepresentations,” Amy Saharia, a lawyer for Holmes, told the judge at the start of a   hearing. Saharia argued that prosecutors didn’t meet the legal requirement for proving that Holmes had criminal intent to commit fraud.

The 38-year-old arrived at the courthouse smiling and accompanied by her parents, much as she did throughout trial, and wore a Covid-19 mask as she entered the courtroom. Her next appearance next month will likely be her last, to receive her sentence, which criminal defence lawyers expect will be almost a decade in prison.

Holmes was convicted of defrauding investors and conspiracy for her role in the collapse of the blood-testing start-up she founded that reached a peak valuation of $9 billion. Her ex-boyfriend and former Theranos President Ramesh “Sunny” Balwani was found guilty in July on similar counts, as well as defrauding patients.

The subject of Thursday’s hearing was a routine request for US District Judge Edward Davila to set aside the jury’s verdict. It’s a procedural requirement to appeal the verdict after sentencing.

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